The Sorrows of Satan

Chapter 41

Crowned with a
mystic radiance as of trembling stars of fire, that sublime Figure
towered between me and the moonlit sky; the face, austerely grand
and beautiful, shone forth luminously pale,—the eyes were full of
unquenchable pain, unspeakable remorse, unimaginable despair! The
features I had known so long and seen day by day in familiar
intercourse were the same,—the same, yet transfigured with ethereal
splendour, while shadowed by an everlasting sorrow! Bodily
sensations I was scarcely conscious of;—only the Soul of me,
hitherto dormant, was awake and palpitating with fear. Gradually I
became aware that others were around me, and looking, I saw a dense
crowd of faces, wild and wonderful,— imploring eyes were turned
upon me in piteous or stern agony, —and pallid hands were stretched
towards me more in appeal than menace. And I beheld, as I gazed,
the air darkening and anon lightening with the shadow and the
brightness of wings!—vast pinions of crimson flame began to unfurl
and spread upwards all round the ice-bound vessel,—upwards till
their glowing tips seemed well-nigh to touch the moon. And He, my
Foe, who leaned against the mast, became likewise encircled with
these shafted pinions of burning rose, which, like finely-webbed
clouds coloured by a strong sunset, streamed outwards flaringly
from his dark Form and sprang aloft in a blaze of scintillant
glory. And a Voice infinitely sad, yet infinitely sweet, struck
solemn music from the frozen silence.

"Steer onward, Amiel!
Onward, to the boundaries of the world!"

With every spiritual
sense aroused I glanced towards the steersman's
wheel,—was that Amiel? … that Being, stern
as a figure of deadliest fate, with sable wings and tortured
countenance? If so, I knew him for a
fiend in very truth, if burning horror and endless shame can so
transfigure the soul of man! A history of crime was written in his
anguished looks, … what secret torment racked him no living
mortal might dare to guess! With pallid skeleton hands he moved the
wheel;—and as it turned, the walls of ice around us began to split
with a noise of thunder.

"Onward, Amiel!" said the
great sad Voice again— "Onward where never man hath trod,—steer on
to the world's end!"

The crowd of weird and
terrible faces grew denser,—the flaming and darkening of wings
became thicker than driving storm-clouds rent by lightning,—wailing
cries, groans and dreary sounds of sobbing echoed about me on all
sides, … again the shattering ice roared like an earthquake
under the waters, … and, unhindered by her frozen
prison-walls, the ship moved on! Dizzily, and as one in a mad dream
I saw the great glittering bergs rock and bend forward,—the massive
ice-city shook to its foundations, … glistening pinnacles
dropped and vanished, … towers lurched over, broke and plunged
into the sea,—huge mountains of ice split up like fine glass,
yawning asunder with a green glare in the moonlight as the 'Flame,'
propelled, so it seemed, by the demon-wings of her terrific crew,
cut through the frozen passage with the sharpness of a sword and
the swiftness of an arrow! Whither were we bound? I dared not
think,—I deemed myself dead. The world I saw was not the world I
knew,—I believed I was in some spirit-land beyond the grave, whose
secrets I should presently realize perchance too well! On,—on we
went,—I keeping my strained sight fixed for the most part on the
supreme Shape that always confronted me,—that Angel-Foe whose eyes
were wild with an eternity of sorrows! Face to face with such
Immortal Despair, I stood confounded and slain forever in my own
regard,—a worthless atom, meriting naught but annihilation. The
wailing cries and groans had ceased, —and we sped on in an awful
silence,—while countless tragedies,
unnamable griefs, were urged upon me in the dumb eloquence of the
dreary faces round me, and the expressive teaching of their
terrific eyes.

Soon the barriers of ice
were passed,—and the 'Flame' floated out beyond them into a warm
inland sea, calm as a lake, and bright as silver in the broad
radiance of the moon. On either side were undulating shores, rich
with lofty and luxuriant verdure,—I saw the distant hazy outline of
dusky purple hills,—I heard the little waves plashing against
hidden rocks, and murmuring upon the sand. Delicious odours filled
the air;—a gentle breeze blew, … was this the lost
Paradise?—this semi-tropic zone concealed behind a continent of ice
and snow? Suddenly, from the tops of the dark branching trees, came
floating the sound of a bird's singing,—and so sweet was the song,
so heart-whole was the melody, that my aching eyes filled with
tears. Beautiful memories rushed upon me,—the value and
graciousness of life,—life on the kindly sunlit earth,—seemed very
dear to my soul! Life's opportunities,—its joys, its wonders, its
blessings, all showered down upon a thankless race by a loving
Creator,—these appeared to me all at once as marvellous! Oh, for
another chance of such life !—to redeem the past,—to gather up
the wasted gems of lost moments,—to live as a man should live, in
accord with the will of God and in brotherhood with his
fellow-men! … The unknown bird sang on in a cadence like that
of a mavis in spring, only more tunefully,—surely no other woodland
songster ever sang half so well! And as its dulcet notes dropped
roundly one by one upon the mystic silence, I saw a pale Creature
move out from amid the shadowing of black and scarlet wings,—a
white woman-shape, clothed in her own long hair. Slowly she glided
to the vessel's edge, and there she leaned, with anguished face
upturned,—it was the face of Sibyl! And even while I looked upon
her, she cast herself wildly down upon the deck and wept. My soul
was stirred within me, … I saw in very truth all that she
might have been,—I realized what an angel a little guiding love
and patience might have made
her, … and at last I pitied her! I never pitied her
before!

And now many familiar
faces shone upon me like white stars in a mist of rain,—all faces
of the dead,—all marked with unquenchable remorse and sorrow. One
figure passed before me dreamily, in fetters glistening with a
weight of gold,—I knew him for my college-friend of olden days;
another, crouching on the ground in fear, I recognised as him who
had staked his last possession at play, even to his immortal
soul,—I even saw my father's face, worn and aghast with grief,
-—and trembled lest the sacred beauty of her who had died to give
me birth should find a place among these direful horrors.

But no !—thank God I
never saw her! her spirit had not

lost its way to Heaven!

Again my eyes reverted to
the Mover of this mystic scene, —that Fallen Splendour whose
majestic shape now seemed to fill both earth and sky. A fiery glory
blazed about him, … he raised his hand, … the ship
stopped,—and the dark Steersman rested motionless on the wheel.
Round us the moonlit landscape was spread like a glittering dream
of fairyland,—and still the unknown bird of God sang on with such
entrancing tenderness as must have soothed hell's tortured
souls.

"Lo, here we pause!" said
the commanding Voice. "Here, where the distorted shape of Man hath
never cast a shadow!— here,—where the arrogant mind of Man hath
never conceived a sin !—here, where the godless greed of Man
hath never defaced a beauty, or slain a woodland thing !—here,
the last spot on earth left untainted by Man's presence! Here is
the world's end !—when this land is found and these shores
profaned,—when Mammon plants its foot upon this soil,—then dawns
the Judgment-Day! But, until then, … here, where only God doth
work perfection, angels may look down undismayed, and even fiends
find rest!''

A solemn sound of music
surged upon the air,—and I who had been one as in chains, bound by
invisible bonds and unable to stir, was suddenly liberated. Fully
conscious of freedom I still faced the dark gigantic figure of my
foe,—for his luminous eyes were now upon me, and his penetrating
voice addressed me only.

"Man, deceive not
thyself!" he said. "Think not the terrors of this night are the
delusion of a dream or the snare of a vision! Thou art awake, not
sleeping,—thou art flesh as well as spirit! This place is neither
hell nor heaven nor any space between,—it is a corner of thine own
world on which thou livest. Wherefore know from henceforth that the
Supernatural Universe in and around the Natural is no lie, but the
chief Reality, inasmuch as God surroundeth all! Fate strikes thine
hour,—and in this hour 'tis given thee to choose thy Master. Now,
by the will of God, thou seest me as Angel,— but take heed thou
forget not that among men I am as Man! In human form I move with
all humanity through endless ages, —to kings and counsellors, to
priests and scientists, to thinkers and teachers, to old and young
I come in the shape their pride or vice demands, and am as one with
all! Self finds in me another Ego ;—but from the pure in
heart, the high in faith, the perfect in intention, I do retreat
with joy, offering naught save reverence, demanding naught save
prayer! So am I,—so must I ever be,—till Man of his own will
releases and redeems me. Mistake me not, but know me!—and choose
thy Future for truth's sake and not for fear! Choose and change not
in any time hereafter,—this hour, this moment is thy last
probation,—choose, I say! Wilt thou serve Self and Me? or God
only?"

The question seemed
thundered on my ears, … shuddering, I looked from right to
left, and saw a gathering crowd of faces, white, wistful,
wondering, threatening and imploring,— they pressed about me close,
with glistening eyes and lips that moved dumbly. And as they stared
upon me I beheld another spectral thing,—the image of Myself!—a
poor frail creature, pitiful, ignorant, and undiscerning,—limited
in both capacity and intelligence, yet full of strange egotism and
still stranger arrogance; every
detail of my life was suddenly presented to me as in a magic
mirror, and I read my own chronicle of paltry intellectual pride,
vulgar ambition and vulgarer ostentation,—I realized with shame my
miserable vices, my puny scorn of God, my effronteries and
blasphemies; and in the sudden strong repulsion and repudiation of
my own worthless existence, being and character, I found both voice
and speech.

"god only!" I cried
fervently. "Annihilation at His hands rather than life without
Him! God only! I have chosen!"

My words vibrated
passionately on my own ears, … and … even as they were
spoken, the air grew misty with a snowy opalescent radiance, …
the sable and crimson wings uplifted in such multitudinous array
around me, palpitated with a thousand changeful hues, … and
over the face of my dark Foe a light celestial fell like the smile
of dawn! Awed and afraid I gazed upwards, … and there I saw a
new and yet more wondrous glory, … a shining Figure outlined
against the sky in such surpassing beauty and vivid brilliancy as
made me think the sun itself had risen in vast Angel-shape on
rainbow pinions! And from the brightening heaven there rang a
silver voice, clear as a clarion-call,—

"Arise, Lucifer, Son
of the Morning! One soul rejects thee;—one hour of joy is
granted thee! Hence, and arise!"

Earth, air, and sea
blazed suddenly into fiery gold,—blinded and stunned, I was seized
by compelling hands and held firmly down by a force
invisible, … the yacht was slowly sinking under me!
Overwhelmed with unearthly terrors, my lips yet murmured—

"God! God only!" The
heavens changed from gold to crimson—anon to shining blue, …
and against this mass of wavering colour that seemed to make a
jewelled archway of the sky, I saw the Form of him whom I had known
as man, swiftly ascend god-like,—with flaming pinions and upturned
glorious visage, like a vision of light in darkness! Around
him clustered a million winged
shapes,—but He, supreme, majestic, wonderful, towered high above
them all, a very king of splendour, the glory round his brows
resembling meteor-fires in an Arctic midnight,—his eyes, twin
stars, ablaze with such great rapture as seemed half agony!
Breathless and giddy, I strained my sight to follow him as he
fled; … and heard the musical calling of strange sweet voices
everywhere, from east to west, from north to south.

With all my remaining
strength I strove to watch the vanishing upwards of that sublime
Luminance that now filled the visible universe,—the demon-ship was
still sinking steadily, … invisible hands still held me
down, … I was falling, —falling,—into unimaginable
depths, … when another voice, till then unheard, solemn yet
sweet, spoke aloud—

''Bind him hand and foot
and cast him into the outermost darkness of the world! There let
him find My Light!"

I heard,—yet felt no
fear. "God only!" I said, as I sank into the vast profound,—and
lo ! while the words yet trembled on my lips, I saw the sun!
The sweet earth's sun!—the kindly orb familiar,—the lamp of God's
protection,—its golden rim came glittering upwards in the
east,—higher and higher it rose, making a golden background for
that mighty Figure whose darkly luminous wings now seemed like
sable storm-clouds stretched wide across the horizon! Once
more … yet once, … the Angel-visage bent its warning
looks on me, … I saw the anguished smile, … the great
eyes burning with immortal sorrows! … then I was plunged
forcibly downwards and thrust into an abysmal grave of frozen
cold.

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